This article first appeared in the _Portfolio_, for November 1874, and
was not reprinted until two years after Stevenson's death, in 1896,
when it was included in the _Miscellanies_ (Edinburgh Edition,
_Miscellanies_, Vol. IV, pp. 131-142). The editor of the _Portfolio_
was the well-known art critic, Philip Gilbert Hamerton (1834-1894),
author of the _Intellectual Life_ (1873). Just one year before,
Stevenson had had printed in the _Portfolio_ his first contribution to
any periodical, _Roads_. Although _The Enjoyment of Unpleasant Places_
attracted scarcely any attention on its first appearance, and has
since become practically forgotten, there is perhaps no better essay
among his earlier works with which to begin a study of his
personality, temperament, and style. In its cheerful optimism this
article is particularly characteristic of its author. It should be
remembered that when this essay was first printed, Stevenson was only
twenty-four years old.
[Note 1: _It is a difficult matter_, etc. The appreciation of nature
is a quite modern taste, for although people have always loved the
scenery which reminds them of home, it was not at all fashionable in
England to love nature for its own sake before 1740. Thomas Gray was
the first person in Europe who seems to have exhibited a real love of
mountains (see his _Letters_). A study of the development of the
appreciation of nature before and after Wordsworth (England's greatest
nature poet) is exceedingly interesting. See Myra Reynolds, _The
Treatment of Nature in English Poetry between Pope and Wordsworth_
(1896).]
[Note 2: _This discipline in scenery._ Note what is said on this
subject in Browning's extraordinary poem, _Fra Lippo Lippi_, vs.
300-302.
"For, don't you mark? We're made so that we love
First when we see them painted, things we have passed
Perhaps a hundred times nor cared to see."]
[Note 3: _Brantôme quaintly tells us, "fait des discours en soi pour
se soutenir en chemin."_ Freely translated, "the traveller talks to
himself to keep up his courage on the road." Pierre de Bourdeille,
Abbé de Brantôme, (cir. 1534-1614), travelled all over Europe. His
works were not published till long after his death, in 1665. Several
complete editions of his writings in numerous volumes have appeared in
the nineteenth century, one edited by the famous writer, Prosper
Mérimée.]
[Note 4: _We are provocative of beauty._ Compare again, _Fra Lippo
Lippi_, vs. 215 et seq.
"Or say there's beauty with no soul at all--
(I never saw it--put the case the same--)
If you get simple beauty and nought else,
You get about the best thing God invents:
That's somewhat: and you'll find the soul you have missed,
Within yourself, when you return him thanks."]
[Note 5: _Callot, or Sadeler, or Paul Brill._ Jacques Callot was an
eminent French artist of the XVII century, born at Nancy in 1592, died
1635. Matthaeus and Paul Brill were two celebrated Dutch painters.
Paul, the younger brother of Matthaeus, was born about 1555, and died
in 1626. His development in landscape-painting was remarkable. Gilles
Sadeler, born at Antwerp 1570, died at Prague 1629, a famous artist,
and nephew of two well-known engravers. He was called the "Phoenix of
Engraving."]
[Note 6: _Dick Turpin_. Dick Turpin was born in Essex, England, and
was originally a butcher. Afterwards he became a notorious highwayman,
and was finally executed for horse-stealing, 10 April 1739. He and his
steed Black Bess are well described in W. H. Ainsworth's _Rookwood_,
and in his _Ballads_.]
[Note 7: _The Trossachs_. The word means literally, "bristling
country." A beautifully romantic tract, beginning immediately to the
east of Loch Katrine in Perth, Scotland. Stevenson's statement, "if a
man of admirable romantic instinct had not peopled it for them with
harmonious figures," refers to Walter Scott, and more particularly to
the _Lady of the Lake_ (1810).]
[Note 8: _I am happier where it is tame and fertile, and not readily
pleased without trees_. Notice the kind of country he begins to
describe in the next paragraph. Is there really any contradiction in
his statements?]
[Note 9: _Like David before Saul_. David charmed Saul out of his
sadness, according to the Biblical story, not with nature, but with
music. See I _Samuel_ XVI. 14-23. But in Browning's splendid poem,
_Saul_ (1845), nature and music are combined in David's inspired
playing.
"And I first played the tune all our sheep know," etc.]
[Note 10: _The sermon in stones_. See the beginning of the second act
of _As You Like It_, where the exiled Duke says,
"And this our life exempt from public haunt
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones and good in everything."
It is not at all certain that Shakspere used the word "sermons" here
in the modern sense; he very likely meant merely discourses,
conversations.]
[Note 11: _Wuthering Heights_. The well-known novel (1847) by Emily
Bronte (1818-1848) sister of the more famous Charlotte Bronte. The
"little summer scene" Stevenson mentions, is in Chapter XXIV.]
[Note 12: _A solitary, spectacled stone-breaker_. To the pedestrian or
cyclist, no difference between Europe and America is more striking
than the comparative excellence of the country roads. The roads in
Europe, even in lonely and remote districts, where one may travel for
hours without seeing a house, are usually in perfect condition, hard,
white and absolutely smooth. The slightest defect or abrasion is
immediately repaired by one of these stone-breakers Stevenson
mentions, a solitary individual, his eyes concealed behind large green
goggles, to protect them from the glare and the flying bits of stone.]
[Note 13: _Ashamed and cold_. An excellent example of what Ruskin
called "the pathetic fallacy."]
[Note 14: _The foliage is coloured like foliage in a gale_. Cf.
Tennyson, _In Memoriam_, LXXII:--
"With blasts that blow the poplar white."]
[Note 15: _Wordsworth, in a beautiful passage_. The passage Stevenson
quotes is in Book VII of _The Prelude_, called _Residence in London_.]
[Note 16: _Cologne Cathedral, the great unfinished marvel by the
Rhine_. This great cathedral, generally regarded as the most perfect
Gothic church in the world, was begun in 1248, and was not completed
until 1880, seven years after Stevenson wrote this essay.]
[Note 17: _In a golden zone like Apollo's._ The Greek God Apollo,
later identified with Helios, the Sun-god. The twin towers of Cologne
Cathedral are over 500 feet high, so that the experience described
here is quite possible.]
[Note 18: _The two hall-fires at night_. In mediaeval castles, the
hall was the general living-room, used regularly for meals, for
assemblies, and for all social requirements. The modern word
"dining-hall" preserves the old significance of the word. The familiar
expression, "bower and hall," is simply, in plain prose, bedroom and
sitting-room.]
[Note 19: _Association is turned against itself_. It is seldom that
Stevenson uses an expression that is not instantly transparently
clear. Exactly what does he mean by this phrase?]
[Note 20: "_As from an enemy_." Alluding to the passage Stevenson has
quoted above, from Wordsworth's _Prelude_.]
[Note 21: _Our noisy years did indeed seem moments_. A favorite
reflection of Stevenson's, occurring in nearly all his serious
essays.]
[Note 22: _Shelley speaks of the sea as "hungering for calm."_ This
passage occurs in the poem _Prometheus Unbound_, Act III, end of Scene
2.
"Behold the Nereids under the green sea--
Their wavering limbs borne on the wind like stream,
Their white arms lifted o'er their streaming hair,
With garlands pied and starry sea-flower crowns,--
Hastening to grace their mighty Sister's joy.
It is the unpastured sea hungering for calm."]
[Note 23: _Whin-pods._ "Whin" is from the Welsh _çwyn_, meaning
"weed." Whin is gorse or furze, and the sound Stevenson alludes to is
frequently heard in Scotland.]
[Note 24: "_Mon coeur est un luth suspendu_." These beautiful words
are from the poet Béranger (1780-1857). It is probable that Stevenson
found them first not in the original, but in reading the tales of Poe,
for the "two lines of French verse" that "haunted" Stevenson are
quoted by Poe at the beginning of one of his most famous pieces, _The
Fall of the House of Usher_, where, however, the third, and not the
first person is used:--
"_Son_ coeur est un luth suspendu;
Sitôt qu'on le touche il résonne."]
[Note 25: "_Out of the strong came forth sweetness_." Alluding to the
riddle propounded by Samson. See the book of _Judges_, Chapter XIV.]